People ex rel. Shinn v. District Court of Fifteenth Judicial Dist., 24632
| Citation | 469 P.2d 732,172 Colo. 23 |
| Decision Date | 25 May 1970 |
| Docket Number | No. 24632,24632 |
| Parties | The PEOPLE of the State of Colorado ex rel. Carl M. SHINN, District Attorney of the Fifteenth Judicial District, State of Colorado; John C. Statler, Assistant District Attorney of the Fifteenth Judicial District, State of Colorado; and Robert G. Rogers, Deputy District Attorney of the Fifteenth Judicial District, County of Prowers, State of Colorado, Petitioners, v. DISTRICT COURT OF THE FIFTEENTH JUDICIAL DISTRICT, State of Colorado, and Robert Sanderson, one of the Judges thereof, Respondents. |
| Court | Supreme Court of Colorado |
Carl M. Shinn, John C. Statler, Robert G. Rogers, Lamar, for petitioners.
Johnson & McLachlan, George McLachlan, Lamar, for respondents.
This is an original proceeding by which the People of the State of Colorado, upon relation of the district attorney of the Fifteenth Judicial District, seek a writ prohibiting the district court of Prowers County from requiring the district attorney to produce prior to trial certain evidentiary materials consisting of witnesses' statements.
Defendant Jonna Scott was charged in a two-count information with violation of the provisions of C.R.S.1963, 48--5--2, which concerns narcotic drugs. Defendant's counsel filed a Motion for Preliminary Hearing and for Inspection of Statements of Witnesses and for Continuance of Arraignment. It is the discovery portion of the motion with which we are here concerned.
The motion requested an order permitting defendant or her counsel to inspect and examine all statements taken by the district attorney's office or any law enforcement agency, whether oral or written, in connection with the criminal action. The district attorney agreed to furnish the statement taken from defendant Scott, but refused to furnish the statements taken from two prospective witnesses. The trial court entered the following order:
'THE COURT FURTHER ORDERS the district attorney to furnish to the Court within fifteen days from this date statements taken by the district attorney's office or any law enforcement agency, and the Court, in an in camera hearing, will determine what portions of those statements will be released to the defendant. * * *'
It is to this order of the trial court that the writ of prohibition is directed. We issued our Rule to Show Cause why the relief requested should not be granted, and the order granting the motion was stayed until further order of this Court.
The question for consideration is whether the Colorado Rules of Criminal Procedure limit pretrial discovery of the statements sought by defendant's motion. At the time of the hearing, the effective rule was Colo.R.Crim.P. 16(b), which provided as follows:
By its terms the foregoing does not expressly compel the production of the witnesses' statements prior to trial. Defendant urges, however, that matters of pretrial discovery in Colorado involve the exercise of inherent judicial discretion and that the discovery rules do not restrict or limit the trial court's exercise of such discretion. We do not agree.
Pretrial discovery was a stranger to criminal procedure in Colorado and the right to such was nonexistent under the common law. Mendelsohn v. People, 143 Colo. 397, 353 P.2d 587; Walker v. People, 126 Colo. 135, 248 P.2d 287; Rosier v. People, 126 Colo. 82, 247 P.2d 448; Silliman v. People, 114 Colo. 130, 162 P.2d 793; Shores v. United States, 8 Cir., 174 F.2d 838. The rules of criminal procedure as they existed at the time of the hearing contained no language which, in our view, granted to the trial court any broad discretion to permit pretrial discovery or production of evidentiary statements. Nor have any of our decisions...
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